‘The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas’
Linux creator Linus Torvalds should know. And one useful way of generating ideas is to do what designers often do at the start of a project: brainstorm them
Google ‘brainstorming’ and you’ll find yourself rapidly invited to a thousand workshops, courses and consultations. But the technique, when first popularised in the 1930s by Alex Faickney Osborn, one of the founders of the BBDO ad agency, was called ‘applied imagination’. And that is how design groups like IDEO use it.
Brainstorming sounds old-hat because every company thinks they do it. But Tom Kelley, general manager of IDEO, makes the point that one survey suggested 76% of firms brainstorm less than once a month – not frequent enough for staff to become comfortable, let alone adept, at the business of applying their imagination. Brainstorming is used in the concept-generation phase of the design process, where the cardinal rule is that no idea is too daft.
And designers use it for one simple reason. It works – as the examples on these pages show. But only if the company culture allows it. Kelley recalls a Silicon Valley boss who kicked off a session with the words: 'I’m looking for some great new ideas. Oh, and every new idea has to be patentable. And something we can manufacture.'
Singin’ in the Rain
1951, Hollywood
Gene Kelly’s charming hoofing in puddles is less ambitious than the Make ’Em Laugh number in which co-star Donald O’Connor runs up a wall and does a somersault. Director and star Kelly knew his co-star needed a solo number but, O’Connor recalled, 'didn’t have a clue what that should be'. So the two sat down, brainstormed ideas – some revamped from O’Connor’s vaudeville act – and created one of the most amazing dance numbers ever.
MIT city car
2005, Boston
It took a ‘Eureka!’ moment and a fruitful brainstorm by MIT colleagues Franco Vairani and Will Lark to devise this car of the future. After noticing how shopping trolleys were stacked together, Vairani and Lark used the trolley idea as a prompt for a session of debate and discussion that led to the first prototype of the City Car. MIT is now working on prototypes that can be mass-produced, rented by commuters and, with special robotic drive wheels, stacked outside subway stations.
LEGO Mindstorm
1999, Denmark
Brainstorming is at the core of Lego’s R&D. Teachers, staff from MIT and the Danish toymaker collaborated to develop the Mindstorm robotics invention system. Lego encourages users – called ‘master builders’ – to brainstorm how they can use the bricks and software, and US researchers are now using a Mindstorm robot in a bid to improve ATM security.
Sgt. Pepper
1966, London
The cover of one of rock’s greatest albums was developed, in concept, at a session between artist Peter Blake, Paul McCartney and art director Robert Fraser. It took much trial and error to turn the concept into reality. It took far less time for the iconoclastic Frank Zappa, no fan of hippie pop stars, to devise his own spoof cover, for his album We’re Only In It For The Money.
ET
1982, Hollywood
Keen to inject authenticity into his blockbuster science fiction movie, Steven Spielberg sat down with NASA scientists to think about what kind of planet an alien might come from and how such a creature might be received on Earth. NASA staff suggested ET came from a 'little green planet' populated by 'little mushroom farmers'. Inspired, Spielberg created a cuddly alien that looked as much like a plant as a creature and struck box-office gold.
Curt Schilling’s tendon
2004, Boston
When Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling dislocated his tendon in the play-offs for the World Series, his season seemed over. The Red Sox medics – led by Dr William Morgan – brainstormed every possible cure. An operation would have sidelined him for months, so Morgan suggested they stitch the tendon in place to stop it flapping. No one had done it before. Morgan successfully tested the technique on a cadaver before trying it on Schilling. The pitcher’s return inspired the Red Sox, who clinched their place in the World Series.
Mazda CX-7
2005-07, Hiroshima
When Mazda design chief Iwao Koizumi was asked to develop a new sports car, he held a session with his designers. Koizumi says: 'There are many genres, traditions and conventions, and the image of a sports car varies greatly. We came up with a universal definition of a sports car that drivers all over the world would love.' This thinking informed the design of the CX-7, launched to acclaim last September.
The Communist manifesto
1847, London
During a marathon ten-day session in a room above the Red Lion pub in Soho in December 1847, the Communist League got together to devise a series of resolutions. These, they decided, Karl Marx would draft as a manifesto by 1 January 1848. Marx bust that deadline but The Manifesto of the Communist Party, as it was known, was printed in February. Marx hoped it would ignite revolution, but it didn’t really inflame anybody until it was printed in Russian in 1869.
Seinfeld
1989, Century City, California
In the fourth series of this classic sitcom, Jerry and George brainstorm about a new sitcom ('It’s a show about nothing') they are pitching to NBC. In real life, this is exactly what Seinfeld and Larry David did after being asked to develop a sitcom with the premise: where does a comedian get material? NBC liked the idea but didn’t like the all-male central threesome, Jerry, George and Kramer, insisting they develop a female character. Brainstorming with Seinfeld, David devised Elaine Benes, based on an old girlfriend, perfecting the formula for America’s most popular sitcom.
Cuban missile crisis
1962, Washington DC
After the Bay of Pigs and a disastrous invasion of Cuba – prompted by the CIA’s erroneous belief that ordinary Cubans would rise up against Fidel Castro – JFK tried a different decision-making strategy when confronted with nuclear missiles in Cuba. His brother Bobby chaired a multi-disciplinary group from all parts of government which considered every possible response and counter-response from the USSR. That group suggested the naval blockade (the original preferred option was an air strike) and a guarantee not to invade Cuba as ways of offering the Soviets a face-saving exit from the crisis.
Einstein’s fridge
1926, Berlin
Even geniuses understand the power of working together. Appalled by news that a Berlin family had been poisoned to death by sulphur leaking from the pump on their fridge, Albert Einstein spent much of the 1920s designing safer refrigerators. Generating ideas with physicist Leo Szilard, he devised a range of fridges that were powered by harmless alcohol gas and fewer moving parts. Though he filed 45 patents, they were never made as they were too noisy.
CCD technology
1969, Murray Hill, New Jersey
In October 1969, Bell Lab scientist Willard Boyle was asked if he could produce a new kind of computer memory. He recalled: 'That afternoon, I brainstormed for an hour with George Smith on a new kind of semiconductor, drawing a few sketches and equations on a blackboard. We called it a charge-coupled device: a CCD.' Ten times more efficient than photographic plates, CCD transformed astronomy, being used in the Hubble telescope and by NASA’s Pathfinder to capture images from Mars.
Article first published in Design Council Magazine, Issue 4, Summer 2008